Christchurch, just like home

Monday 16th June did not ever exist for us. We left Chile on Sunday 15th and arrived in NZ on Wednesday 17th after a 13 hour flight and passing through a time zone. A day of our lives we will never get back...........................

Just look at what greeted us, the 1st rain we have seen in 7 months!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well miserable English-like rain anyway, totally different to tropical downpours.

We had obviously clocked up a bit of weight in the old packs in South America, as Ed's pack came off the flight labelled as heavy goods!

So what greeted us in NZ? Firstly a weird culture shock as things are clean and tidy and people don't spit in the street all the time, lawns are manicured and cars drive VERY slowly! We had to stop ourselves saying gracias all the time too. Secondly, a very English like feel. Christchurch, where we landed, is basically like Canterbury or even good old Lichfield, so a feeling of homesickness set in a little. It is on its way to winter here, a lot colder than a UK winter, but it was so nice to walk in the park and see the autumn leaves.

These photos are slightly weird we know, in fact the one of me (Nicky) at the top is possibly the worst photo of me in existence. We stayed at a converted jail in Christchurch. A weird place, kinda cold, uncomfortable and very institutional (Ed said it reminded him of his secondary school, DGSB) but with lovely beds and a really good kitchen plus THE BEST showers so far and so they should be for the price. New Zealand has been a shock to the old budget!!!

The other thing that has been great is food! Tea with proper milk, sausage and mash for dinner and lovely bread. The South American weight loss is going to take a downturn for us both we think......

Chau for Now Sud America, Vamos a volver!!!!!

Well the 7 months is up and sadly we cannot extend our time. We have loved every minute of our time here ( well for me, Nicky, apart from cycling that bloody road in La Paz) and are so sad to leave such a vibrant, crazy at times and blossoming continent behind. There is no way we can say what was our favourite place but highlights have been Buenos Aires, Iguazu Falls, Rio Carnival, Brazilian beaches ( all of them!), Salt Flats in Bolivia, Inca Trail, Sand boarding in Huacachina and Snowboarding in Chile.

We will miss the culture, the language, the haggling, and Ed will miss rice and meat set lunches. I will not! We are looking forward to, normality, no stray dogs, crossing roads easily and people queuing in a nice polite and English way again!

Oh and the spitting in the street thing, men and women we will not miss...never got used to that.

Rest assured we will be back one day!!

Valparaiso, love it or hate it?

Valparaiso is a crazy city on the coast 2 hours from Santiago. We reckon you either love it or hate it.

It's kinda dirty in places ( smells of pee too) with a lot of smacked out looking stray dogs and winos. But it is also bohemian ( a favourite term here) and has a lot of character, especially in the hillside barrios. We stayed on Cerro Concepion, the nicest of these Barrios. You access them using funicular railways., literally like lifts built into the side of the hills. The buildings are all colourful and cling to the sides of the hills like artsy favelas.

There isn't a lot to do in Valpo. You just wander about and look at the crazy graffiti and sit in cafes, and drink Chilean wine, so it can't be all bad!........

WHAT ARE YOU DOING FOR YOUR RIGHTS?

Nicky looking more than a little suspicious about the Chilean instituition of a "completo", basically a hotdog destruoyed by excessive toppings of mayonaise, avocado, onions, tomatoes, and anything else they have laying around. Wrong, is all I will say.






And below you can see one the lifts up to the hills

El Colorado, putting the chill into Chile

Ed´s mum Mum Andro funded our time on the icy slopes of El Colorado, an hour outside of Santiago, as a 30th birthday present. THANKS MUM! We had 2 very happy days up there, before our time and money run out. Well, Ed got a cold on day 3 so we are saving it for New Zealand.

The 1st one is Nic, virgin snowboarder, on her first day. Pretty impressive. We don't know who was more surprised that she was instantly so good, and that she fell in love with it so quickly. Finally a shared past time aside from boozing and listening to music.



The 2nd one is Ed, a bit tentative after not being on a board for over a decade. Nic´s instructor said his riding style was a bit "80´s". He told him that was when I learnt!

El Colorado is at 3300m, so is pretty good but the season had only just started and it wasn´t snowing much overnight. Consequently it got a bit icy. Great views, as usual, of the surrounding mountains. The worst bit was the drive up, on the most windy roads in the world. Especially as you are climbing from practically sea level to that altitude in about an hours drive.

For me (Nic), the hardest bit was the drag lift. There are no chair lifts for the lower slopes. After a painful experience years ago on one of these on a dry ski slope, I had a mental block. It took 12 attempts on day 1, all failures, then a further 2 attempts on day 2 for me to get it. A big thanks to Ulysees the lift operator who must have thought I was an idiot but was so helpful and kind! And had the tightest squeeze in the world when he hugged me in this photo below.

Santiago, Chile. Don´t believe the hype (pt 2.)

As you can see from the lovely flag in the background, we´ve finally arrived in Chile after a lengthy journey south from Arequipa in Peru. It took 42 hours by bus. Between the ridiculous amount of time stuck on a bus and the constant customs checks from the paranoid Chileans (you cannot take any fresh food into Chile, but there is no chance that you could given how much they check you) we were knackered. One check was a very rude poke in the arm to wake us up and get off the bus in the middle of the night. Chile had not put itself in a great light.....

But after a good nights sleep in a cold but comfy bed in Hostel La Chimba, it wasn´t so bad. In fact, as per usual with us we love Santiago, when everyone else said it was rubbish. How can a city with a view like the below be rubbish? There´s not a whole lotta places where you can see massive snow capped mountains from the city streets!!! It has a quiet and relaxed vibe despite being very big. We stayed in the lovely arty Barrio Bellavista. It is full of crazy old tumbledown houses and nice bars and restaurants. Good enough for us!

Ed just had to get a pic of the classic scooter above. Apparently it´d be worth a lot of money back home coz its quite rare. It looks like a pile of junk to me!

There isn´t tons to do in Santiago, but there are lovely parks and plenty of museums. We went up to the top of the Cerro San Cristobal, but no trekking! Thankfully there is a funicular railway up. The unique thing is that they have 2 mountains right in the city centre. Cerro San Cristobal houses a huge statue of the Virgin Mary and an open air church that overlooks the whole city. The Pope JP said mass up there once, apparently.

The sunset up there was amazing. Santiago is very smoggy so the sunsets are really pink and hazy.They are madly into graffiti here too, in the same way we saw in Buenos Aires, loads of stencil stuff. This one is kinda in contrast to the nice peace and love stuff above. It says, nothing is free.
That´s not quite true. We had a very nice free wine tasting night in our hostel. We got completely trolleyed for nothing!

This was my personal favourite.

"Less is more". Short people of the world unite! And, yes I am wearing socks with pumps.

It´s bloody freezing!